Animating the Mechanism

Animation can help you predict the mechanism’s behavior and refine its design before manufacturing. You can animate your mechanism during or immediately following a simulation.

One frame of animation is created for each output step.

Animating a Simulation

To animate a mechanism, you must first simulate it. Nearly all of the simulation and animation controls are located on the COSMOSMotion toolbar or in the Simulation panel. The other simulation and animation settings are located in the Options dialog box.

To animate a mechanism:

1. If the COSMOSMotion Simulation Panel is not open, select Motion and then select Show Simulation Panel or select the button.

2. Simulate the mechanism by selecting the Calculator button on the Simulation Panel.

3. After the simulation is complete, select any of the arrow buttons to animate the mechanism forward, backward, fast forward, or fast rewind. Select the stop button to stop the animation or simulation.

4. To change the animation settings, open the Options dialog box by selecting the Options button on the Simulation Panel.

5. Select the Animation tab.

6. Modify the animation settings as desired, and then select OK to close the dialog box. Learn more about setting animation options.

7. Continue to animate your mechanism using the arrow buttons, as needed.

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Playback Controls

The animation playback controls are, from left to right:

• Mechanism Reset - Resets the mechanism to its original configuration after a simulation or animation. You can also reset by selecting Motion and then selecting Reset.

• Fast Rewind - Plays the mechanism in the reverse direction but skips frames so the animation is faster than regular play. You can control the number of skipped frames in the MSC.ADAMS Options dialog box.

• Reverse Play - Plays every frame of the animation in the reverse direction.

• Stop - Stops a simulation or animation.

• Forward Play - Plays every frame of the animation in the forward direction.

• Fast Forward - Plays the animation in the forward direction, skipping frames so that the animation is faster than Forward Play. You can control the number of skipped frames in the Animation Settings dialog box.

In the Simulation Panel, you can drag the scroll bar to move the mechanism to any frame in the simulation.

Mode

The Mode option list controls the animation mode. You can set the mode to:

• To End - The animation plays one time, either forwards or backwards, and stops.

• Loop - The animation plays to the end, goes back to the beginning of the animation, and plays through again. The animation plays until you select Stop.

• Retrace - The animation plays forward to the end, and then plays in reverse back to the beginning. The animation plays until you select Stop.

Time/Frame

The Time and Frame text boxes allow you to directly enter specific time or frame positions to which you want to skip. If a specific time is not in the results, the nearest result is chosen.

You can control the display of motion symbols, such as joints or result forces, from the Mechanism settings dialog box. See Animation Settings and Results Settings.

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